Ok. Ok. While she certainly doesn’t look it, I admit that the recent changes to the Mystic don’t reduce the ability to solo level. In fact, it appears that, at least in levels from 1 – 40, the Mystic is now Over Powered like the other classes in Tera.

One of the ways that I judge being over powered is to take on a BAM – Big Ahem Monster – at the same level and see if I can solo it. When Ninja came out we were shocked at how over powered it was. And then Gunner came out and it was Over Powered. And then Valkyrie came out and we saw the pattern. The recent changes to mystic, while changing things around quite a lot, actually make the class more powerful than it was. And it was fine before.

The Thrall of Vengeance – while it operates like a totem, and looks like something from the Ghostbusters movie, actually has a lot more aggro and health than it did before. So if you give it a couple of glyphs to increase power and length of time it survives it’s quite a good BAM killer. I actually used it to solo a BAM all by itself at 32. You might have to drop another one during the fight, but the cool down is short enough that this is no problem.

The Thrall of Wrath has been Nerfed a little at these levels. While it is a good opener for a BAM, it’s not powerful enough to finish off a BAM the way it used to be.

Ok. So it’s Wow’s 13th Anniversary and we got glasses and a XP Buff with a nice Tabard for the rest of the month.

Last time we talked about how Tera changed the Mystic skills sometime around May 2017 when I wasn’t playing. And they basically messed up leveling by removing the tank pet which used to arrive at level 4 and delayed it until level 50. Update: See at the end

Notice you get a Summon Imp spell – which is a ranged DPS pet that follows you around – at level 5. This is not a totem that is fixed in place for a limited time, but a pet that does not time out, follows you around and attacks what you attack. You get control of it – Move it, Passify it, Sick it on a target, etc. – at level 10. You get the Voidwalker, which is the tank pet, at level 20. There are lots more pets, some of them are higher level talents, which means you get choices about which ones etc.

Sometime during this year, apparently, the Mystic class was completely changed. Turned on it’s head actually.

The biggest issue from my point of view is that the Thrall of Protection, a tank for solo leveling, was changed from level 4 to level 50. So you no longer have a tank to use during solo leveling.

This is a severe quality of life change as far as I’m concerned.

Basically the entire class skills have been turned on it’s head.

Skills that you get when you were level 60, you now get when you are level 4. So instead of getting Thrall of Protection so you can solo easily, you now get Boomerang and Contagion, which are AOE skills that were added with the level 60 update a few years ago.

After playing World of Warcraft back in 2011-2013, then Tera and Guild Wars 2, I’m back playing Wow again. I’ve been watching two things:

How to level up most efficiently.

How to make enough gold to progress in the game.

There have been a few changes in Wow since I played it, or at least there appear to be. And this note looks at those changes in the economics by comparing Wow with the other two games I’ve been playing.

The first thing I’ve noticed is that changes in a game that are made to allow folks to level up faster greatly affect the economy, or can. And in some cases they can basically wreck the economy for some groups of players.

I’ve been playing a Berzerker recently after playing the new Valkyrie. This is a Zerker that’s been sitting for a year or more at about level 40, and I’ve played it recently for about 10 levels, so the equipment it currently has is based on the recent changes that reward tokens for Vanguard Requests.

My issue is that after all this time, the older classes, like the Berzerker, have not been updated to the new standard of DPS shown by the other classes.

Starting with Reaper of course, the recent classes have all been overpowered, but Blue Hole studios has never gone back to update the previous classes to the same DPS standard that these new classes enjoy.

Having recently played 3 Valkyries – on three servers – up to 65, as well as all the previous overpowered classes, I’m very familiar with the DPS done by the newer classes, and the recent upgrades to the classes that the Battle Solutions and Token gear provides as one levels a character. As I play this Berzerker it is readily apparent that this class is lagging both in DPS done and in survivability because of vulnerability during skill wind up times. In spite of the fact that the Berzerker is wearing plate armor, compared with the Valkyrie Leather armor, the Valkyrie is more survivable – takes less damage – because it’s attacks occur much more quickly and often cause stuns.

When you reach 65 as a Valkyrie, you can open your Level 65 Reward Box. I’m not clear if this is always going to be given to levelers, or whether it’s a reward from the “Event” for the introduction of the class. But it’s got some sweet gear in it. Level 65 toons are given class specific Idoneal Gear, which is Tier 4. This reward box contains “Slaughter” gear Tier 9 gear including a Masterwork +12 weapon, and a full set of Armor. Well, you don’t get the armor, but you get enough Undercede currency items – 225 – to buy the full set of armor and accessories.

I’ve got a couple of my Valkyries to level 65. With all the buffs and XP Boosts during the event, it’s not that hard. The trick is to run a couple of dungeons though. I ran the Armory twice on one character and the Armory and the Catacombs each on the second character. With both of them I reached 65 before going inside the fortress for the final battle with Dakuryon. Things were a lot easier at the higher level, even though you don’t get a better weapon and I didn’t bother going back for the better armor.

Of course there is the new Valkyrie class. She’s a babe with attitude, but that’s no different from all the recent class additions. All female, all gender / culture locked and all over-powered. I’ve been away from Tera for a while doing other things. Guild Wars 2, Wow Private Servers, and Guild Wars 1. I left Tera back a while ago when they nerfed Guilds. Took away the guild bank unless you had lots of dedicated players, so the guild bank was locked away from family or multiple account players. But I’ve come back to try Valkyrie and found a few things had changed.

They seem like minor changes and they simplify the game, but some of these changes appear to have had unintended, or at least disappointing consequences.